A Day in The Life . . . . . . Of China: Free to Fly Inside the Cage

• Share

(7 of 18)

I get it, finally, when I chance on a hot seller at a bookstore in Xi'an, the capital of Shaanxi province, deep in the heart of China. Buried in A Guide to U.S.A., The Visitor's Companion, is a section titled "Individualism." A sample observation: "People in the United States generally consider self- reliance and independence as ideal personal qualities. As a consequence, most people see themselves as separate individuals, not as representatives of a family, community, or other group . . . Visitors from other countries ((read China)) sometimes view this attitude as 'selfishness.' "

I get the point again in Shanghai, the city called the "Paris of the East" during the Roaring Twenties; a place made famous forever when, in the 1932 film Shanghai Express, Marlene Dietrich drawled, "It too-oo-k more than one man to change my name to Shanghai Lily." Shanghai is no longer trendy, modern or even cosmopolitan, but its streets are still tops for infant watching. Sadly, though, the toddlers I see seldom cry or laugh or even suck their thumbs. Most seem sullen. And in the beautiful Jing an Park, which used to be a cemetery before the bodies were exhumed for cremation (the old story about the land's being too valuable for the dead), the kids ride around in bumper cars in careful circles and don't wave and don't smile and stare straight ahead and never once smash into one another -- which by now even I know is the whole point.

Most Chinese nursery schools display a mural of young, cherubic children riding a dragon. The dragon represents China; the well-fed kids symbolize a prosperous future. But outside a primary school in Kai Kong, a factory town in Guangdong province, the traditional mural is decidedly modern. There isn't anything special about the dragon, but the fat children are carrying cameras, videocassette recorders and boom boxes.

As a metaphor for Xinhua (New China), the Kai Kong mural is perfect. And no area in New China has taken more readily to Deng's economic freedoms than Guangdong, the province on the southeastern coast that borders Hong Kong. Famous for being shrewd businessmen, Guangdong's residents also have a long tradition of ignoring imperial edicts. Even today the province negotiates its tax remittances to Beijing, in part because the national government's ability to control various localities differs greatly depending on an area's wealth, strategic significance and the personal connections and acumen of its leaders.

In a sense, Guangdong can be viewed like the Soviet Union's Baltic states, the province's relative wealth representing a willingness to stretch the rules to fit whatever works rather than restrain expansion to fit the rules. Left alone, which it may not be, Guangdong will continue to provide the nation with both hard currency and an example of entrepreneurship at full throttle.

Not surprisingly, Guangdong's success has produced severe envy, what the Chinese call "red eye" disease. The neighboring province of Hunan feels particularly aggrieved by what it sees as Guangdong's economic warlordism. Faced with the migration of millions of its residents to Guangdong, Hunan on occasion has even gone so far as to establish border roadblocks to stem the flow of materials and people.